Shoes, glorious shoes!

Remember Imelda Marcos? The only reason I do is because of the tremendous uproar that came about when her stash of hundreds of pairs of shoes were found in the palace after the downfall of her husband's regime. The Philippines, remember? OK, I just googled it and there were 2700 pairs of shoes LEFT BEHIND. I can remember that vividly only because I thought to myself... "excessive? really? I just don't think so". If you know me at all, you know I love shoes. I could seriously buy a pair every day. I read a blog recently by another shoe lover and she used the word "shoegasm". Oh mah gah! what a glorious word.
My inventory doesn't hold a candle to Imelda's, but it's somewhere in the less-than-a-hundred range. I don't own any expensive designer shoes like the kind you see on all the Housewives (teehee) but I wouldn't decline them if they were offered. And I do covet them. I don't own many flip flop styles of shoe (hate that fwappa fwappa sound), nor sport shoes. Eegads, that would imply I'm going to have to sweat.  Mostly, I have shoes for work or "dress-up" shoes. You really can't have enough black shoes, but I am concentrating on adding more color to my stash. Stacy London says to use your shoe for a pop of color in your wardrobe. I love Stacy. And Clinton. And I love her choice of shoes.

If you ever see me wearing the shoes above, I will be at a Halloween party dressed like a monkey. And I would not have paid a nickel for them, I would have borrowed them from someone who is not a friend of mine, 'cause friends don't let friends wear crap on their feet.

I would wear any of these shoes. I have some similar, and when I wear them, I carry a spare pair in my car, so I can change out during the day. I'm crazy about shoes but that doesn't mean I'm crazy. I know my limits. Four hours is about all I can handle in a stiletto and that's only if I am sitting a lot. But damn, I look good.

So as spring shoes arrive in the stores, I tend to linger in the shoe department a little longer than anywhere else in the store. Mostly trying on shoes. I could do that all day long. I LOVE to go to places like TJ Maxx because the correct shoe size is sitting right there on the shelf just waiting for me to slip on my foot. I hate shopping where I have to ask for someone to go in the back and get my size - what a pain in the patoot.
Back in the 70's, they had people in the shoe department (mostly men... like Hal Bundy) that not only had to go get your size, but then sat in front of you on that weird little shoe salesman bench and actually put the shoe on for you. I hated that!!! A lot! It totally creeped me out. First of all, I wore the tiniest little dresses and skirts back then and sitting with some stranger directly in front of your crotch area was frightening in a pedophile sort of way. There simply wasn't any way to discreetly lift your leg up to that shoe bench without displaying the merchandise. And second of all, it was the 70's. I was a liberated woman. I didn't need help putting on a shoe, thank you very much. To by-pass the "system" I would: find a shoe I loved, ask for it in my size, buy it, take it home and try it on in the privacy of my salesman-free home. Then, if it did not fit, I would return it to the store. Ugh! a HUGE pain in the patoot. I was elated when decades later, the "system" changed to Try-On-Your-Own-Damn-Shoes.

So, thanks mom, for the shoe fetish. I got it honestly, and as long as I can still walk in them without busting my butt, I will continue to have cute shoes and lots of them. Not to mention the shoegasms.

Double Trouble

That's the name my sister and I call our business. We make and sell snowmen from vintage bottles and found objects. It is a very hard craft to describe, but when you see pictures of them it all makes sense. We went on a bottle hunt today in Webb's Antique mall near Lake City. Jan found a booth on a recent trip, that had nothing but bottles (score!) so we decided to go and make an offer on a bulk purchase. Luckily for us, the booth owner cooperated, and we now own 70 more bottles that we will turn into snowmen for this fall craft show season. Finding vintage/antique bottles is not as hard as you'd think, but finding them for what we are willing to pay is another story. We don't really know much (or care) about the history of the bottles, we just like how they look, and love how pretty they turn out when we are finished creating a snowman out of them.
We have been very successful selling them and actually have "fans" who buy multiple snowmen for their collections. (Thank you, dear fans)

This is the banner we use in our booth display. If you are ever in our area at a craft show and see that banner, stop by and say HI. We love to have company. Or, check us out at www.etsy.com/shop/boogirl99

Some of our snowmen are there, but not very many.

Last year around this time, I was in my favorite place to shop: TJ Maxx/Homegoods. I saw this bunny...

and thought how cute his head was. I took my camera out and photo'd him (yeah, I know, I should have paid for it if I was going to copy it) and came home with creative juices flowing. I love when that happens. Anyhow, this is the result of that...

a little vintage perfume bottle, a little clay, a little bit of found objects, and some glitter = Double Trouble. This bunny was a one of a kind. I intended to make more, but alas, time got away from me. C'mon, Jan, let's make some bunnies!

Bert

Catch-Up Day

I have been so danged busy for so long and have sadly neglected my blog. This is a place for me to collect my thoughts and share, but I haven't done much of that lately. One of my New Year's resolutions is to focus more on the good things in my life and blogging is one of them. So, I am posting some things today to try and catch up with myself.
One of my favorite things to do at work, is thank the people who work in other departments, but do sooooo much to support our department. Mostly, I like to make a small little sump'n sump'n to give each person along with a heartfelt "thanks". We jokingly call them suck-up gifts (SUG for short), but we really do appreciate their help when we need them. I make around 40, so I am always looking for something that isn't going to cost way too much. Anything under a dollar is good for me. Here are a few of the things I have shared with my coworkers...

Dollar Tree Lolli's

I found these cute little lollipops at Dollar Tree (6 for a $ - score!) They had 3 pink and 3 red in each package. Each one has a cardstock heart with a "to" and "from" on it. This doesn't even qualify as something I made, but none the less, it is a cute SUG. I simply wrote "we heart you" on the tag. I will give them out next week when it is a little closer to VDay.

Memorial Day pin

This was a big hit! I bought small American flags on a stick at Michael's for 39¢, removed them from the stick and then folded them up like you would a real flag. I hot glued the ends and then added a pin back to it with more hot glue. I made a card to present them that was embellished with a denim background paper and stamped a patriotic message inside. Love these! Hooray for the USA

(that's me in my office. I really LOVE my Mac, and Photobooth. I don't need no stinkin' camera)

This is another fave SUG. Easy peasy to make and makes a very impressive display. I bought a box of Lifesavers at Sam's, covered them with patriotic background paper, printed out Avery mailing labels with a message "Stars and Stripes Forever!" and then added the cutest firework toothpick that I found at Michael's. I also stuck a little flag toothpick in with the firework pick (also came from Michael's).  I gave these out last year on Memorial Day and people still have the picks on their desks cause they are that darned cute.

I have been making SUG's for years now, for every occasion (Christmas, Easter, Valentine's Day, 4th of July, Memorial Day... you name it) but haven't photographed any until recently. My vow to myself... keep better photo files, and share. Next up... St. Patty's Day.

Ribbit

Love this... I found her in a wonderful little gift shop in downtown Alachua. I levitate towards things that make me smile, and this little thing did just that. How cute is this?! There were 3 different  Yoga "poses" but this one spoke to me the most. It is on my filing cabinet in my office, right in front of a mirror, so you can see her cute little butt in the reflection. Too flippin' cute.